CNET recently took a look at the Insignia NS-2BRDVD Blu-ray player and gave it a rating of 5.8 out of 10 (2.5 out of 4 stars). The Insignia is a bargain Profile 1.1 player with a starting price under $200. A firmware upgrade coming in March 2009 will make it a Profile 2.0 player.

Although the CNET review summary states that the NS-2BRDVD delivered a solid 1080p HD picture, in fact, it failed most of their image-quality testing. For instance, the player could not depict all the resolution of a text pattern provided by Silicon Optix’s HQV Blu-ray test suite. It also performed poorly in two other picture-quality tests.

Some other characteristics CNET did not like were poor DVD playback quality, slow Blu-ray disc loading, and lack of onboard decodng for Dolby TrueHD DTS-HD.

Links

CNET review of the Insignia NS-2BRDVD

Starting Sunday, November 23, Sears.com has the Panasonic DMP-BD35 Blu-ray player on sale for $150. The player won the coveted Editor’s Choice award from CNET as one of the best Blu-ray players for the money. Unfortunately, it looks like the site quickly sold out of them. No word on if they’re getting more in stock.

*Update* Looks like they removed it entirely from their online store. Bummer.

Link

Panasonic DMP-BD35 $150 at Sears.com

Dell Home (link) will have some HDTV-related deals for Black Friday. The most impressive is an XBOX 360 Arcade with 7 games, including Rock Band 2, for just $199. Wow. Check out all of Dell’s HDTV-related Black Friday deals below:

Sony BDP-S350 Blu-Ray Disc Player $249.99. This is a great player, but K-mart has same model for $180 on Thanksgiving Day. (Link.)

Sony HDX275 Home Theater System $229.99. 5-disc DVD/CD changer. 1000 watts. iPod dock. DVD upscaling to 1080p. HDMI interface.

Sharp LC42SB45U 42″ 1080p LCD HDTV $779.00. This is Sharp’s bargain line of LCDs. Not a bad price. Sears will have a 46-inch Sharp Acqous 1080p LCD for $900. (Link.)

XBOX 360 Arcade With 7 Games Including Rock Band 2 $199.00. The Arcade bundle includes 6 packaged games like Feeding Frenzy, Luxor 2, Boom Boom Rocket, Pac-Man Championship Edition, Uno, and Superstars Tennis. The real value is the addition of Rock Band 2, which is $60 on its own. Doesn’t come with instruments, however.

Via BlackFriday.info

CNET recently reviewed the new Panasonic DMP-BD35 Blu-ray player ($299) and gave it their coveted Editor’s Choice with an 8.0 out of 10 rating. The DMP-BD35 is a Profile 2.0 player, and CNET noted that it’s the first player Blu-ray player with all of the essential features of the PlayStation 3 at a much cheaper price.

They liked the Panasonic’s image quality for Blu-ray discs, and even said they feel it equals the quality of the PS3 (the PS3 is currently the gold standard of Blu-ray players). They also liked the player’s slim styling, in-player decoding for all high-res audio (Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio), and bit-stream output. The only cons were that the PS3 has faster disc loading and navigation, and some other functionality like media streaming and online movie renting that the Panasonic doesn’t.

The old argument that the PS3 was the best value for a Blu-ray player is losing some steam. If you’re a game player, the PS3 is still the best choice. But if you only want to play Blu-ray movies, there are now options that meet the PS3′s quality for a much cheaper price. Check out CNET’s video review below:

Links:

CNET’s review of the Panasonic DMP-BD35

Official site for the Panasonic DMP-BD35